Rainbow Connection: I Tried Sand Art Hair

My passion for Crayola-hued hair is no secret; I even documented my transition to pastel pink on this site just a few months ago. But all good things must come to an end, and as that color slowly faded to dirty blonde and my natural roots began to show, I found myself becoming a little bored. In a moment I can only describe as an act of divine providence, I stumbled across this video on Youtube. Sand art hair? I just found my new look.

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Christine Hahn

I put my hair into the trusty hands of Luis Payne, the brilliant artistic director of NYC's Hairroin Salon. Together, we set to work on a very particular vision. I wanted to steer clear of warmer colors like red, orange and yellow, which I associate with bad dye jobs. Inspired by this editorial in Grazia France, I decided on a palette of blue, green, purple and pink, with a little pastel thrown in for good measure.

Before he could get to work on the fun part, Payne needed a clean palette. Using Pravana bleach and Olaplex (a salon-only wonder product that keeps hair from getting damaged during the color process), Payne took my hair—a mix of old highlights and my natural color—to light yellow before toning it to a silver-platinum shade. I was feeling very Daenerys Targaryen-esque, but not for long.

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Christine Hahn

Instead of straight lines, Payne separated my hair along the diagonal, into triangle-shaped sections. "This way there's no starting or stopping point [with the color]," he explained. "It flows and doesn't look too dated, too '90s-esque."

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Christine Hahn

For the transformation, Payne used Pravana's brand-new color system, Vivids Locked-In. The new technology allows stylists to apply several different shades to strands without the colors bleeding into one another.

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Christine Hahn

We started with six main colors—pink, blue, yellow-green, a bluish-purple, violet, and a pastel purple-gray. As Payne worked, he mixed in Pravana's Vivid Clear formula to produce lighter shades and pastels—perfect for creating a more muted palette around my face.

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Christine Hahn

After the application process, Payne let the color sit for 30 minutes before rinsing out.

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Christine Hahn

Payne used approximately 12 different shades to achieve this dramatic effect. The best part? Depending on where I part my hair, a completely new range of colors reveals itself.

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Christine Hahn

After a fresh blow-out, we decided to try out some traditional Hollywood pin curls on the decidedly non-traditional hues.

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Christine Hahn

Though I knew what I'd signed up for, I never imagined this as the end result. Payne exceeded my expectations by far. Reactions to my new look range from, "You're the only person who could pull that off!"and "Is it a wig?" to "Do you hate your face?" (the latter coming from my 92-year-old grandfather, so he gets a pass). But I could not be happier—and for once, I'm not even thinking about what my next look will be. How could I ever top this, anyway?

Update, 7/14: With so many readers inquiring into the cost of the sand art process, BAZAAR asked Payne to explain the cost of each part of the transformation:

Payne took our editor's hair from grown-out highlights to white blonde with a color-correction process that begins at $350 for the first two hours at Hairroin. Since this particular session took five hours, the total for the color correction comes to $650. At Hairroin, the sand art service starts at $150 for three colors; additional colors are $20 each. Since Payne used between eight and 12 colors on our editor's hair, the total for the sand art process came to $250. Overall, the entire transformation cost $900.

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